lawyer and friend of Dr. Jekyll once punned on his name: “If he be Mr. Hyde, I shall be Mr. Seek.”
Hyde actually comes to represent the embodiment of pure evil merely for the sake of evil. Readers? first encounter with him is that he is seen running over a young girl, simply trampling over her body and leaving her screaming on the ground. He does not do this out of spite--or intentionally; it is simply an amoral act, although he makes reparations. He raises a fear, and a deep loathing to other people in his first appearance, except this, Hyde?s features, something displeasing, something ugly, and something deformed, makes people horrible at the first sight to see him. Looking at his face could raise people?s desire to strike out at him and kill him. The following is the descriptions of Hyde?s appearance.
“?but gave me one look, so ugly that it brought out the sweat on me like running.”, “?every time he looked at my prisoner (Mr. Hyde), I saw that Sawbones turn sick and white with desire to kill him.” , “He is not easy to describe.
There is something wrong with his appearance; something displeasing, something down-right detestable. He must be deformed somewhere; he gives a strong feeling of deformity, although I couldn?t specify to point.” From the above, Edward Hyde is known as a horrible ugly and deformed being. His appearance merely scared readers and other characters in the novel, no matter to mention his frightening behaviors. He is much younger than Jekyll. Besides, he is much smaller than Dr. Jekyll, whose clothes are far too large for him. Since Hyde represents the purely evil in Dr. Jekyll, his appearance symbolically suggests his detested evil deeds. Except the terrible and disgusting look, Hyde?s actions make people feel scared. His servants are extremely frightened of him. When they think he is around the house, the servants cringe in horror, and some go into hysterics; on the contrary, Dr. Jekyll has a tall, handsome figure, and a good set of features, which symbolically represents the brightness of good. He is loved and respected by his friends, servants and the people who know him. It seems that Mr. Hyde is unable to cease violence.
What is more, his demon becomes more and more pronounced. Mr. Hyde startles the whole London a year after his first appearance. He commits a murder. The victim, Sir Danvers Carew, an aged beautiful gentleman with high position, is bludgeoned to death
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by a heavy cane for absolutely no reason rather than inquiring his way with a very pretty manner of politeness. Readers are shocked too, and believe deeply without any doubt that Edward Hyde is an evil man. He is made up of pure evil elements. He is a representative of evil. He is demon, whereas Dr. Jekyll stands for good.
2.2 Dual Personality
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is so popular that the term Jekyll and Hyde becomes the nickname of dual personality, and collected in dictionaries. For example, in Oxford Advanced Learner’s English-Chinese Dictionary, it is explained: “Single person with two personalities, one good (Jekyll) and one bad (Hyde)”
Readers are prone to analyze Dr. Jekyll from the perspective of ethics approach. Obviously, Dr. Jekyll is good, Mr. Hyde is evil. But those readers forget one established fact that Mr. Hyde comes out from Dr. Jekyll. They two actually are one. Moreover, this interpretation does not conform to the purpose of Stevenson to create this novel. He planned to shape a character with two opposite sides in one body. The character was tortured by the violent conflict between the two contradictory sides.
Dr. Jekyll is a famous and respectable person with high social statue in London. He has an admirable life. However, to everyone?s surprise, the violent, terrible, inhuman, and ape-like Hyde is him too. When he is Henry Jekyll, he attends and organizes parties, drinks and chats with friends, and does charity works. When he is Edward Hyde, he is apt to get angry, and makes violent actions. He tramples on a small girl. He bludgeons an old man to death, which shock every human being. Towards Jekyll, kind readers have much more sympathy rather than hatred, because the readers see clearly that the intense struggles between the good and the evil inside his body. He conflicts fiercely on whether to transform or not. Finally, his instinctual impulsion wins over his conscious of obeying the moral rules. Though he is happy to be Hyde, he suffers much and painfully for what Hyde did. He cannot help drinking the down-to-Hyde drug. He tries his best to control his desire of becoming Hyde. However, Hyde gradually begins to take the ascendancy over the good Dr. Jekyll. Besides, the potion of
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back-to-Jekyll loses efficacy. Edward Hyde never ever changes back to Henry Jekyll. Desperately and hopelessly, he kills himself to finish this painful alternation.
Avoiding breaking the Victorian morals rules and law regulations, Dr. Jekyll restrains and oppresses the other kind of desire inside his body. He keeps on finding a way to release it, for the process of suffering the struggle is beyond his ability to bear. The release of other side pleases him, and brings him great happiness, though it is very short. Readers follow the steps of Mr. Utterson, the Holms-like layer to detect and discover Jekyll?s secret. Together with the layer, readers find out a fact as still as a stone at the end of story: Hyde is the other side of Jekyll. Dr. Jekyll is a person with two personalities.
R. L. Stevenson interests in the topic of two personalities, because he thinks himself has the similar experience. He has to obey his father on the condition to sacrifice his true hopes and desires. He enters Edinburgh University, chooses engineering as his major, then compromises to learn law. However, he does not always follow his father. He goes against the will of his father, and breaks away from his family profession. He keeps long hair, wears odd clothes, disobeys the church, and marries a divorced woman. All those make his father angry, and he stops to support him. Although Mr. Stevenson wants to be the son that his father wishes, he also wants to be the one who follows his own wishes. So, confused by his situation, combining with his experience, and adding certain artistic imagination, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, a novel of dual personality, is coined.
However, some people question the dual personality of Dr. Jekyll in the novel. “But Hyde also exists outside of Jekyll?s dream. He has energy, a will to be alive, that doesn?t fit so readily into the novel?s dualistic scheme. Just as the remark that Henry Jekyll is good; Edward Hyde is evil; the point of dual personality is also argued by critics. Vladimir Nabokov has another point of view on Dr. Jekyll, which will be introduced.
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Chapter Three Psychoanalytical Criticism
Previous studies of Dr. Jekyll are introduced in the above. Some scholars and critics have mentioned about the relationship between Dr. Jekyll and the psychoanalytical criticism, to be exact, the structure of personality theory. Some people think that Mr. Hyde represents the id, while Dr. Jekyll is the ego. However, there is no detailed analysis or studies about it. In this section, it will be studied and analyze in detail.
The structure of personality theory is a branch of psychoanalytical criticism, which consists of the id, the ego, and the superego. The id, a kind of instinctual impulsion, attempts to come out. The ego on the behalf of the reason tries its best to control the disordered id, and modifies its act, making its act within the region of moral and law. Combining the theory with Vladimir Nabokov?s analysis on Dr. Jekyll, Mr. Hyde can be equated to the id; Dr. Jekyll to the ego; and the third, the remaining ring of good, to the superego. As soon as the id out of control, the superego, who on the behalf of morality, will punish the ego. Oppressed by the id and the superego, the ego struggles fiercely. Regretted, pained, and despaired, Dr. Jekyll kills himself. Henry Jekyll chooses a wrong way to fulfill the desire inside his heart. If his way were proper, he would not need to suicide.
3.1 Personality Theory
The systematic theory psychoanalytical criticism was put forward by Sigmund Freud, and developed by other psychologists such as Carl Jung, Jacques Lacan, Norman Holland, and so on. Freud pioneered the use of this theory in his clinical treatment. However, he has never expected that his theories have more influence in literature filed than that in psychology filed. The psychoanalytical criticism is composed of several theories. Taking the well-known ones as examples, there are the Oedipus Complex, the Interpretation of Dreams, and the Structures of the Mind.
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The structure of the mind is divided into the structure of consciousness and the structure of personality. The structure of consciousness, namely, is conscious, unconscious and preconscious. The structure of personality is id, ego, and superego.
3.2 Id, Ego, and Superego in Dr. Jekyll
“For strict Freudians, Hyde will be immediately understood as the primitive, instinctual nature of human being turned loose without censure or balance. Hyde represents the uncivilized craving for reckless pleasure.” The “primitive, instinctual nature of human being” and the “uncivilized craving for reckless pleasure? can be called the id.
Before suicide, Dr. Jekyll wrote a letter to his friend and a lawyer, Mr. Utterson to make a confession about the event. He described the reasons why he tried to become Mr. Hyde in detail. He was born in a wealthy family, destined to have a great deal of wealth in all his life. Moreover, he also has a lot of talents, which make sure he can earn much money. He was a lucky dog, and destined to a very brilliant future. His wealth and high social status and he were admired by the kind-hearted common people. As a youth, he thinks that perhaps he was too light-hearted. He enjoys many youthful indiscretions, which he was very careful to keep secret. “I regarded and hid them with an almost morbid sense of shame.”
And there came a time when he realized that his professional career could be ruined if one of these indiscretions were to be exposed, and so he repressed them. However, it was very hard for him to suppress his other side. Later, he found that the dark side of him was unconquerable. Not bearing the sorrow and suffering of the bearing, he tried to set it free. He has been fascinated with the theory that man has an “Angle” side and a “demon” side, and he has decided to investigate the theory. “It chanced that the direction of my scientific studies, which led wholly towards the mystic and the transcendental, reacted and shed a strong light on this consciousness of the perennial war among my members.”
Therefore, he began his investigations, and he was successful. He compounded a kind of potion that could release a person?s evil, which would form to be another entirely different physical person. Then one could commit acts of evil and feel no guilt;
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